


no shelter in the storm

by SPTRD



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst, Introspection, M/M, Self-Hatred, Self-Worth Issues, Triggers present
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-09
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-07-14 00:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7143806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SPTRD/pseuds/SPTRD
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All Eren ever wanted was to be loved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	no shelter in the storm

He doesn't remember how it's come to be like this. It seemed at first a slow slide and then very much a rapid descent into worthlessness and depression. He hides it well, a leftover talent from his high school days, where everything was colorless and tasted of ash. He has promised himself and another to keep far from the precipice that had called to him so insistently junior year. Promises are meant to be broken, he muses bitterly. And now in the face of despair - which had once broken him so easily and so cruelly - he cannot help but to disengage, shutting away the people he loves in the feeble hope that it will lessen the blow. He tries not to think of what his own ultimatum is, but it lurks on the edges of his consciousness. Sleep and rest and nonexistence, that's all he's ever wanted. Or rather, that's all he's ever deserved.

He's felt this same darkness before, young and dumb and sixteen, before dark eyes and pale hands pulled him from his deepening spiral.

Eren fell in love with those eyes and those hands - however, he now loves Levi simply for Levi, not just the man's integral part of his recovery. But sometimes he doubts if Levi realizes. The purity and simplicity of Eren's regard is unassuming and asks of nothing from Levi. Lately, however, Eren hasn't been entirely convinced that the flash of bitterness he sees in grey eyes is merely imaginary, a by-product of his own self-loathing. He knows that it is quite possible - perhaps even likely - that Levi begrudges him for the rather complicated nature of their relationship. The man might feel trapped and chafed within the confines of Eren's love. Certainly he has not been too trapped or chafed to hide the glances he's been trading with the pretty little redhead at the convenience store around the corner.

Maybe it is only Eren's inferiority complex rising, but he can't help the jealousy that stains his insides. She's beautiful and light and friendly. There would be no pressure and no consequences for Levi with a girl like her. Eren has always put too much stock in the healing powers of relationships, and perhaps Levi has tired of Eren's expectations. The man wouldn't find any of those expectations in her, at least. This is enough to push Eren barrelling back down the path he swore he left behind in high school. It's a familiar ache in his chest, the loneliness, and it welcomes him like a old friend. Exhaustion creeps from the woodwork and rattles Eren in its grip.

He shakes it off every now and then, the necessity of his attention and regard proving to be an adequate motivator. Inevitably, it creeps back in, which is why he's standing in threadbare pyjamas before the mantel, clutching a duster and fighting back tears that seem hollow and utterly devoid of grief.

Levi finds him like that ten minutes later, and he is ostensibly concerned.

"Eren?"

"Yes?"

"What are you doing?"

"...nothing."

"You do realize you're probably terrifying the mantel? You shouldn't glare it into submission; that's bad for it's psyche." Now Levi sounds amused.

"Mantels are inanimate objects, Levi," Eren replies flatly. That perks the other man's attention - normally Eren is the first to indulge his skewed sense of humor.

"Alright then," Levi sighs. "What's wrong, Eren?"

Eren sneers, his face hidden by his hair and the duster. Levi is acting like Eren's behavior is a burden, nothing more than a child acting out in a tantrum. Eren supposes that his rising angst is nothing more to his significant other than an inconvenience. In that moment, he hates Levi.

"We should break up." Levi blinks a few moments in mute shock. Eren sees the confusion and barely-concealed hurt surface in his eyes in the reflective urn on the mantel. The puckers on Levi's brow smooth away quickly though, cementing Eren's theory that he himself has ceased to mean anything of significance to the man.

"Eren, what brought this on? Have you been missing your medication?"

It's always the medication. A way to keep Eren gagged and bound within his own head, either floating high above anything resembling reality, or drowning beneath crushing waves of nothingness.

"Don't pawn this off on neat little excuses," Eren snaps. "You can't box it up, and drop the package somewhere else for someone else to take care of. You can't invalidate this; you can't invalidate me!" He's only just keeping a lid on the explosive rage that seems to spawn from nowhere and takes on a mind of its own. His temper is legendary, but no one has ever realized that Eren fears his anger more than anyone else. At times it is like a sentient being, controlling his every word, and burning the strongest of bridges gleefully.

And Eren sees it gunning for the end of his relationship. It obviously pursues more lasting devastation now. He realizes this, and resigns himself to the fallout sure to tail his outburst.

———

Oh, it's an ugly fight. Neither of them get out unscathed, and Eren's heart feels battered and worn and small by the end of it.

Levi is breezing out the door, as a cooly and callously as the first time he sauntered in and made himself at home. Eren watches him go with a tragic sort of helplessness, but his mouth stays shut, trapping apologies behind his teeth.

The poisonous words he flung like barbs hang as heavy echoes in the room. Adding to their weight is the sinking dread and white-hot, blistering hatred perpetually directed towards himself. Neither are new feelings, but they are exacerbated by the cruel taunts that Levi threw back at him in a knee-jerk reflex to repay pain for pain. Eren thinks that he and Levi might not be so different in this regard.

None of it measures up to the guilt that lies sticky and tar-black in his throat, though. It was this guilt that choked him and stole away his ability to speak, making it impossible for Eren to plead with Levi to stay.

So instead he must watch as the brightest star in his life snuffs out, walking away from him without so much as a backward glance.

This is the end, Eren thinks numbly. This is the long, good night.

He can only bring himself to feel relief.

**Author's Note:**

> -sigh-
> 
> I don't even know why I wrote this


End file.
